Hi All,
Just bought a Western Digital TV HD 1080P Media Player - all set up with the latest firmware now installed. I need simple step by step instructions to enable me to rip a movie to my HDD and play it with my Western Digital TV HD 1080P Media Player. So far I have managed to rip a movie with "AnyDVDHD/CloneDVD". The resulting file(s) (contained in a VIDEO_TS folder) will not play on the Western Digital TV HD 1080P Media Player and so, I guess, need converting. I want to keep the files uncompressed. I've had a good look around this forum and cannot find the simple answer I'm looking for. In summary I need a guide - best way to:-

1. Rip content to HDD
2. Convert to a format supported by WDTVHD

If someone could provide me with a link to same, or indeed a a simple step by step idiots guide I'd greatly appreciate it. Thankyou.

***Correction - I have subsequently found that .VOB will play on the WDTV***

So.......... I'm guessing it isn't that easy after all !! :rolleyes:

MakeMKV rips the files directly into a mvk file including chapters, audio tracks, etc.

Dunno if it's playable that way

Correction to my initial post - the WDHDTV does play unconverted .VOB files. I just tried again putting individual .VOB files into a folder on my USB hard drive and bingo - the files play. Only problem is they do not "flow" - when one file ends, there is a break before the next one plays - so the movie is broken onto 7-8 parts - which is annoying - obviously. Any ideas as to how to seamlessly join them?

I can't help you if you're trying to rip blu-ray, but if you're doing normal DVDs and want them encoded with divx, I recommend using Fair Use Wizard. The WDTV will play these flawlessly. You can probably google how to do it; it's pretty straight forward.

Also, DVDShrink still works well and will let you rip DVDs to an ISO (avoiding .vob file structure).

VIDEO_TS diretory with correct structure of .IFO and .VOB files inside as ripped from a DVD should play OK, but just the main title...if there are more titles inside, only the largest one will play...each title needs to be ripped separately to either a VIDEO_TS directory of their own each or put together in a directory that IS NOT NAMED VIDEO_TS...

Also, with DVDShrink a single .vob can be made from a movie that's separated into 1GB .vobs...this is perhaps the safest way and guaranteed not to produce a pause...

anyway, even if it is 1:1 rip, mpeg-2 makes the files, well, compressed form the word go!!! :D

Correction to my initial post - the WDHDTV does play unconverted .VOB files. I just tried again putting individual .VOB files into a folder on my USB hard drive and bingo - the files play. Only problem is they do not "flow" - when one file ends, there is a break before the next one plays - so the movie is broken onto 7-8 parts - which is annoying - obviously. Any ideas as to how to seamlessly join them?

http://www.digital-digest.com/dvd/downloads/showsoftware_vobmerge_108.html

Guys, Many Thanks for your replies so far.

I have since found that the WDHDTV will play unconverted .VOB files as obtained from "Clone DVD" - Excellent. Not so Excellent is the inability to select individual songs from, say, a music DVD just as you would when playing same on DVD player from a "scene select" screen. At the moment I have just, effectively, one giant .VOB file, and getting to the track at the end of a 2.5hr file is tedious to say the least - have to use "fast" fwd (x16 max). Is it possible to truly clone a DVD so that the WD can play it - as if on a standalone player? Failing this, did I hear somewhere that I can skip through chunks of a file with the new firmware? (I do have the latest firmware but cannot find a way of "skipping" through vobs)

Guys, Many Thanks for your replies so far.

I have since found that the WDHDTV will play unconverted .VOB files as obtained from "Clone DVD" - Excellent. Not so Excellent is the inability to select individual songs from, say, a music DVD just as you would when playing same on DVD player from a "scene select" screen. At the moment I have just, effectively, one giant .VOB file, and getting to the track at the end of a 2.5hr file is tedious to say the least - have to use "fast" fwd (x16 max). Is it possible to truly clone a DVD so that the WD can play it - as if on a standalone player? Failing this, did I hear somewhere that I can skip through chunks of a file with the new firmware? (I do have the latest firmware but cannot find a way of "skipping" through vobs)

WDTV is not a DVD player and this function is not advertised or documented - it's there for the AVSforum community...I already pointed out that renaming a directory from VIDEO_TS or AUDIO_TS enabales playback of all .vobs inside on the file-by-file basis (skipping from vob to vob)...also you can jump in 10 min intervals by pressing FWD or RWD closely followed by NEXT or PREV buttons...

I have found out how skip 10 mins (hit fwd/rwd then hit skip). Skipping VOBs isn't going to work on the DVD I'm working on right now - It's a 20 song music DVD split over 6 .VOBs - the songs sometimes start in the middle of the file! Don't get me wrong here - I love this thing - I just want a little more control over it! Perhaps splitting one big VOB file into tracks will be the only answer for me (I have a lot of music DVDs which I want easier access to). Anyone reccommend software to edit VOBs?

Anyone reccommend software to edit VOBs?

You can do it from inside DVDShrink: choose re-author, drag the title you want to the left and choose set start/end frames (record the exact timecodes of songs on a DVD player software OR if songs are actually chapters, you can just choose which chapter to extract to a separate title...repeat for each song inside the original title and you should have what you need...

Thanks Mytbyte - I'll give it a go ;)

OK so I tried using Shrink DVD. It works fine for a "Full Title" rip, and it seems to work fine for "start/end frame" rips. The full rips will play on the WDHDTV but the "start/end frame" rips wont - file type not recognised - weird :rolleyes: Any ideas as to why?

Glad ShrinkDVD is working for you! I might try that one too. You should try AutoGK also! It works great.

I have found out how skip 10 mins (hit fwd/rwd then hit skip). Skipping VOBs isn't going to work on the DVD I'm working on right now - It's a 20 song music DVD split over 6 .VOBs - the songs sometimes start in the middle of the file! Don't get me wrong here - I love this thing - I just want a little more control over it! Perhaps splitting one big VOB file into tracks will be the only answer for me (I have a lot of music DVDs which I want easier access to). Anyone reccommend software to edit VOBs?
I would recommend using makemkv, It converts the video into a set of MKV files, preserving most information but not changing it in any way. The MKV format can store subtitle and multiple video/audio tracks with all meta-information and preserve chapters.
If you have pre-ripped DVD's on your hard drive, conversion takes about 5 to 10 minutes to complete.
I've used this free program on many ripped DVD's to preserve the interactive feel on the WD TV Media Player.
It allows me to add names and thumbnails to main movie titles and special video features from the disc into folders and subfolders with no issues.

Sounds perfect. So this will allow me to use the skip button for chapter selection on the WDTV yes? I will give it a go just as soon as I get the chance. Thanks :)

OK so I tried using Shrink DVD. It works fine for a "Full Title" rip, and it seems to work fine for "start/end frame" rips. The full rips will play on the WDHDTV but the "start/end frame" rips wont - file type not recognised - weird :rolleyes: Any ideas as to why?

really????....I will try to do it myself and see what you mean...maybe you did something wrong...theoretically, the result of this should be the same number of .vobs as there are songs on the original DVD-A...

Sounds perfect. So this will allow me to use the skip button for chapter selection on the WDTV yes? I will give it a go just as soon as I get the chance. Thanks :)
Not sure if you can skip chapters in a main movie mkv file but, the program should
copy your music videos as individual mkv files.
Allowing you to rename them to place in a folder with thumbnails for playback on
the media player.
I've done this on a few animated series titles, where I have main episodes with
thumbnails in one folder and, special video features in another.
It's tedious but, the results are good!
Doing it this way allows me more DVD like functionally because I can save all DVD
related video in subfolders to one main "Movie Name" folder.

Ok, I did one quick test with MakeMKV, and it did translate chapters from DVD title to mkv...only on WDTV you can't skip by using NEXT and PREV but need to choose chapters icon from the OPTIONS bar which presents you with a list of chapters where you select the one you want...not a big deal but a bit stupid nevertheless...

of course, the video and audio are untouched, they're exactly as they were on the DVD...

Ok, I did one quick test with MakeMKV, and it did translate chapters from DVD title to mkv...only on WDTV you can't skip by using NEXT and PREV but need to choose chapters icon from the OPTIONS bar which presents you with a list of chapters where you select the one you want...not a big deal but a bit stupid nevertheless...

of course, the video and audio are untouched, they're exactly as they were on the DVD...
Choose chapters icon from the OPTIONS bar?

From the remote or from the screen display?
Not sure what you mean but........

Stupid depends on your way of looking at things because this device
can do a little more than people realize.

Anyway, as I've stated before, if you put the renamed mkv files with thumbnails
into a folder, you're able to use the the next/prev button to advance to the next selection or, use the play button to play
all files in that folder back to back. You can even shuffle playback, which works great for music videos.
I do this with Apple Quicktime Trailers to showcase the device.
Also, I have the device set to Thumbnail mode not List mode!

Choose chapters icon from the OPTIONS bar?

From the remote or from the screen display?
Not sure what you mean but........


Well ,you press the OPTION button on the remote and you are presented with that blue bar on the top of the screen...you selesct the CHAPTER icon which is the rightmost on the bar and you get a list of all the chapters within the mkv file...

the problem is not with playing files sequentially (you can do it even with .vobs if you rename the directory form VIDEO_TS to something else so no need to remux into mkv...the problem is if you rip a DVD you don't get to skip chapters within a .vob which is remedied by remuxing it into an mkv with MakeMKV AS YOU YOURSELF SUGGESTED! :D

Well ,you press the OPTION button on the remote and you are presented with that blue bar on the top of the screen...you selesct the CHAPTER icon which is the rightmost on the bar and you get a list of all the chapters within the mkv file...

the problem is not with playing files sequentially (you can do it even with .vobs if you rename the directory form VIDEO_TS to something else so no need to remux into mkv...the problem is if you rip a DVD you don't get to skip chapters within a .vob which is remedied by remuxing it into an mkv with MakeMKV AS YOU YOURSELF SUGGESTED! :D
I completely understand what you're saying....

Originally, Loftboy wanted a solution to separate music videos from DVD's into individual files for playback on the WD Media Player.
This may be one possible solution to achieve that so, if this suggestion works for Loftboy then, problem solved!

At least for now....

I completely understand what you're saying....

Originally, Loftboy wanted a solution to separate music videos from DVD's into individual files for playback on the WD Media Player.



as I understood, he has DVD-A disc with songs (not music videos but music without the video :D) spanning across multiple vobs making a single title, but songs are separated into chapters i.e, there is not a separate .vob for each song...Makemkv might solve this, sure, but I am not sure if there would be any incompatibilites with that since I don't have any DVD-A discs...

as I understood, he has DVD-A disc with songs (not music videos but music without the video :D) spanning across multiple vobs making a single title, but songs are separated into chapters i.e, there is not a separate .vob for each song...Makemkv might solve this, sure, but I am not sure if there would be any incompatibilites with that since I don't have any DVD-A discs...

Actually no - I have "A/V" DVDs i.e. "concert" DVDs if you like - effectively movies - but of concerts. The info offered so far by all of you has been very useful to me. I'm finding that I can rip a DVD, using makeMKV, straight to my WD USB hard drive (I don't need compression). Whereas no skipping from chapter to chapter is a pain, at least chapter selection from the WD menu is possible. All I need now is advice on how to rename "chapter 03" to an actual song title. Adding a thumbnail to view in browser view would be the cherry on the top but not crucial for me. Thanks for your answers - much appreciated ;)

As mkv does support chapter titles, I'm afraid you cannot do that with MakeMKV neither can you split chapters into separate mkv files...

EDIT: You are in luck, as are we all :D...just made an mkv using MakeMKV to rip the whole DVD title into an mkv, then I used mkvmerge from mkvtoolnix (http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/win32/mkvtoolnix-unicode-2.9.8-setup.exe) to open the mkv file I created using chapter editor/load from the mkvmerge's menu bar...here you can select each chapter and rename it whatever you like and save over the same file (just select chapter editor/save)...the new chapter titles do appear on WDTV's chapter list...sweet...:D

[QUOTE
EDIT: You are in luck, as are we all :D...just made an mkv using MakeMKV to rip the whole DVD title into an mkv, then I used mkvmerge from mkvtoolnix (http://www.bunkus.org/videotools/mkvtoolnix/win32/mkvtoolnix-unicode-2.9.8-setup.exe) to open the mkv file I created using chapter editor/load from the mkvmerge's menu bar...here you can select each chapter and rename it whatever you like and save over the same file (just select chapter editor/save)...the new chapter titles do appear on WDTV's chapter list...sweet...:D[/QUOTE]

Just spotted your edit mytbyte - mighty man! - sweet indeed - exactly what I was looking for - thanks a million :)

Glad to be of help :D

http://handbrake.fr/ - One stop shop. You do not have to do separate tasks, you can make MKV's with chapters of your DVDs, and choose your encoding settings. Much much simpler than doing it any other way.

Just downloaded Handbrake this morning but didn't have time to check - can you name your chapters whatever you like or it just uses the Chapter 01, Chapter 02...etc system?...MakeMKV extracts chapters but doesn't allow to rename them...

just use mkvmerge GUI after MakeMKV to rename them

http://handbrake.fr/ - One stop shop. You do not have to do separate tasks, you can make MKV's with chapters of your DVDs, and choose your encoding settings. Much much simpler than doing it any other way.
Simple is good but, how much time does it take for encoding compared to
MakeMKV?

just use mkvmerge GUI after MakeMKV to rename them

sure, that's exactly what I suggested in post #25 :)

@mulam: it should take roughly the same ammout of time for Handbrake if it's not re-compressing the video since makeMKV just re-muxes the elemantary streams from whatever into mkv, it doesn't transcode...basically a copy operation...

-1 to the handbrake vote. I have yet to successfully convert a DVD using handbrake. The audio tracks are always out of sync.